Evander Holyfield Stops Botha In 8th

Evander Holyfield proved he’s still got some of the real left in his game in stopping Francois Botha by technical knockout on Saturday and picking up the WBF heavyweight title.

Behind on points, Holyfield mounted a counter attack and beat a game Botha before less than 3,500 at the Thomas and Mack Center to win yet another world title.

Holyfield (43-10, 28 KOs) started slowly as usual while Botha kept a steady attack in the early going. The former South African held and hit many times including some blatant rabbit punches but kept the pace under his control for the first three rounds.

Botha (47-5-3, 28 KOs) couldn’t slow down Holyfield, though he did hurt him, and slowly the American heavyweight began to find his zone and burrow in for his punches.

In the seventh round Botha was stunned, but in the eighth round he was dropped for a knockdown. Though he survived to beat the count, Holyfield cornered him and fired punches that forced referee Russell Mora to halt the fight at 55 seconds of the eighth round.